2-5fps - where is my bottleneck?

Hi, I run a system with these components: AMD Athlon 2100 (1750MHz), 1Gig RAM, Nvidia FX5200 graphics adaptor in an AGP 4x slot. Compared to Flight simulator 2004, where I get 15-20 fps at much complexer sceneries (and random traffic like other planes), 2-5 fps at SL is pretty disappointing. Of course I use the newest graphics driver, my hard drives are not fragmented, cache is set to 500MB. The fps figures are after all details have downloaded, my viewing distance is 96m. In addition I see that the cache seems to be pretty ineffective. Continuously swapping between 2 average locations leeds to frequent downloads of textures and objects that have not changed since my last visit. Why are they not pulled out of the cache? But my biggest concern is my framerate. Where should I invest first? Thanks a lot for your help!
Horst

Though I have an ATI card, I found I got much better performance using the Omega Drivers for it, rather than the manufacturer standard drivers.

You're right about SL caching.. it is the pits. Make sure you set your cache size to the highest value (1GB) in Edit|Preferences as well. Also, there is a long-standing bug in the texture loading algorithm which causes "pulse lag" due to massive texture thrashing after you've traveled around a few sims. The only thing that seems to help is more video memory on your video card, and that only delays the inevitable.

The only other options are to reduce draw distance, fog distance, scene details/complexity, and any other video setting in the graphics tabs in Preferences.

You should already have looked into any causes for your system to be slow outside of SL, like disabling background applications which are running, etc.

The two things that I see based on the information about your system. First would be the memory. I would recommend an upgrade to 2 gigs as more memory means a speed up of the entire system which will help you out greatly. The true bottleneck though is your video card. this is in no way to be insulting but the nvidea FX 5200 has been deemed a very low end card. It has a lower bus speed, lower processer then comparible priced cards. I would recommend stepping up to a 256 mb vid card either by ati or nvidia with a faster processer and pipeline architecture. If you do a search on google there are plenty of good video card comparison sites that will give you a listing of the pros and cons of each card in a price range. Lastly, as the previous poster stated, omega drivers are preferred over the manufacturers. All of my experiences with drivers has led me to Omega drivers each time.

I hope this helps. If you have a particular price range in mind or budget, let us know. i am sure someone here will be glad to point you in the right direction for best bang for the buck.

I have terrible system (1 ghz P3, 512 mb ram) and get better performance on SL depending on the sim's lag. On empty sims I get 30-40 fps easily, even with loads of people around me. I don't know why it lags so bad with a lot of people and objects in a sim if I'm not close enough to draw all of them, but it does anyway.

I have other friends with top of the line systems who get awful performance on SL in full/lagged sims so I don't think it's your hardware.

Loli, which graphic adapter do you have?
Horst

HUrst, I am running quite comparable to you 2.13Ghs AMD athlon a FX5200 256meg 1 gig ram on a 70% full HD ..I get that once it a while (I didn't see where you put is that the 128 card or the 256) most the time I can stay a consistant 15-17 FPS and spikes to 30-35fps if less than 10000AVs are on why is that I don't know.

Set your draw to 64 low tarain 1 fog ratio , open the view of your fps and try diffrent things I got mine running quite well. Another thing is to open the client >rendering> make sure the something objects is checked (I can't remeber what its called not in world right now. But the other night I had 0-2fps in an empty sim only when looking a certain way, Live help Linden saved the day with that one mine was unchecked